Falcons added three players in the back end of the draft, with one pick in the fifth round and then two in the seventh. Marquis Spruill from Syracuse, Yawin Smallwood from UConn, and Tyler Starr from South Dakota are all the newest members to the team.
Spruill comes to the team after playing four years for the Orange. He comes off a career that featured 243 tackles (41 for a loss), 12.5 sacks, and a forced fumble.
The cool story about Spruill getting picked up by the team in the fifth round. Is the Falcons traded their sixth and seventh round picks for Spruill’s services. He also found out the team was drafting him when he was getting in the car to head over to his college graduation.
The team says the they will play Spruill as an inside linebacker.
Yawin Smallwood is another linebacker taken in this draft, with the Falcons using their first compensatory pick of the seventh round to get him. Smallwood comes in after a sub-par performance at the NFL scouting combine, running a 5.01 second 40 yard dash time.
He’s said to be a very good pass rusher according to Rob Rang of NFLDraftScout.com. He’s also said to be very good at getting off blocks, because of his long arms.
During his three year career at UConn Smallwood picked up 332 tackles (27 for a loss), eight and a half sacks, and five forced fumbles.
Rang says that Smallwood is almost a “poor mans version” of New Engalnd Patriots linebacker Jarrod Mayo. I’m sure Falcons fans wouldn’t mind that.
Then you get to Tyler Starr from South Dakota. Starr is a linebacker with long flowing blonde hair, that actually has its own twitter page.
While playing at FCS powerhouse South Dakota, Starr picked up the school record for sacks at 27 and picked up 13 forced fumbles during his career. He was the Falcons final pick at 255 overall.
In all total the Falcons picked up nine players in this draft. One offensive lineman, a defensive lineman, one running back, two defensive linemen, and four linebackers. The team gets the rookies on campus at their facility starting tomorrow. They’re allowed to start working out with the team on Monday, then the rookies will start mini-camp on Friday.
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